Take a Walk With a Heavy Pack for Surprising Gains

This is Your Quick Training Tip, a chance to learn how to work smarter in just a few moments so you can get right to your workout.

Even if you think you’re too fit to call normal walking a workout, you’re likely familiar with the benefits of getting as many steps as possible every day. In addition to the metabolic boost of increasing your daily activity level, upping your step count can help you beat stress, enhance memory and cognition, and increase mental wellbeing. And magnifying its physical benefits is easy: Do it with a heavy backpack.

In the fitness world, walking with a weighted pack is called rucking, and the military has been doing it for, well, ever, to help troops get (and stay) fighting fit. That’s also where the name comes from—in the military, “ruck sack” is soldier-speak for backpack.

The concept is similar to the principle of progressive overload used by weight lifters. By increasing your load during an activity—in this case, walking—you increase the challenge to your muscles and cardiorespiratory system, spurring your body to not only expend more energy to tackle the task, but also to adapt more comprehensively to handle the challenge next time. The result: More calories (and fat) burned, and more strength and stamina built.

Your move: Grab a backpack, load it up, and take a walk. Fifteen to 20 pounds is a good place to start, and you don’t have to be fancy about it. Load your pack with dumbbells, bricks, sand, water bottles, canned vegetables—anything you have on hand in your weight room, toolshed, garage, or pantry—and head outside. If you want to shoulder a pack specifically designed for this type of heavy carry, there are bags made specifically for rucking from companies like 5.11 Tactical and GoRuck.

Walk as fast as you can, for as long as you can, as frequently as you’re able. Taking your dog for a stroll? Load up. Commuting to the office on foot? Add a few extra pounds to your work bag. Want to switch up your cardio routine? Throw in a rucking session and take it to the hills to maximize its benefits. The more weight you bear, the faster you walk, the farther you go, and the more challenging the terrain is, the greater your results will be.

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